Man found murdered in Maha; police cracked case on basis of whisky bottle and locket

Thane: Two persons were arrested in connection with a murder case, which the Bhiwandi Police claimed to have cracked merely on the basis of a batch number on a whisky bottle and a locket found from the crime scene.

Addressing a news conference in Bhiwandi last evening DCP Bhiwandi Division Sudhir Dhabade and ACP Chandrakant Joshi told newsmen that an unidentified man was found brutally murdered by some unknown assailants in the powerloom town on January 13 and an offence under sections 302, 201 rw 34 of the IPC was registered with the Narpoli police station of Bhiwandi.

Representational image. AFP

The police, which recovered the victim's abandoned body, were clueless in the initial stages of the probe as they could not get find anything except a whisky bottle and a locket of Sri Vishweshwari Group on his person. A thorough probe into the crime with the help of the batch number on the whisky bottle led the police to Monica Hotel of Bhiwandi after which the CCTV footage in the hotel was examined.

To the surprise of the police team the shirt and the shoes that were worn by the victim matched with the one worn by a person seen in the footage who had visited the hotel along with two others for a drink. Later, police got in touch with the said Sri Vishweswari group at Varanasi and published pictures of the victim in the media there.

Soon, the parents of the victim identified him and approached the police. The victim was identified as one Rajnish alias Rahul Shiv Charan Singh. Subsequently, the probe moved on two others accompanying Singh in the hotel. Investigations revealed that both of them were residents of Allahabad in UP and were identified as Anuj Pandey and Ankit Pandey.

Getting to know about their whereabouts, police rushed to Allahabad and nabbed Anujkumar Pandey who was preparing to leave for Gujarat on 12 February. Further probe revealed that the other accused Ankit Chandrashekar Pandey was visiting Mumbai to meet his relatives at Seepz in MIDC Andheri, from where he was picked up on February 14 night.

Senior PI Narpoli police station DD Shivthare said the motive behind the killing was that the victim had a love affair with the sister of the first accused which was not favoured by the girl's family and hence they wanted to get rid of him. As part of their plan, the duo took Singh for an outing and after a drinking session clubbed him to death, police said.